Life Story Links: August 20, 2024

“There’s something about a quiet morning with my notepad and pen that opens doors and windows to the ways of my heart.”
—Joanna Gaines

Vintage postcard of Ellis Island, New York, postmarked 1913, from the personal ephemera collection of Dawn Roode.

Miscellaneous stories for family historians, memoirists, and memory-keepers

FAMILY HISTORY STORYTELLING
In a recent episode of the Family Tree Magazine Podcast, Utah–based personal biographer Rhonda Lauritzen offers tips for writing your ancestors in an engaging way, including developing them as characters in your family stories.

REMEMBRANCE AND LOSS
Fifty years ago, the Central Intelligence Agency unveiled a memorial to CIA members killed in service to the country. Today, the memorial has become hallowed ground. “Every star is a life.”

A LITERARY SELF-PORTRAIT
“I really hope that even if my experience isn’t exactly like somebody else’s, that they can see aspects of themself in it,” Anna Marie Tendler says of her new memoir, Men Have Called Her Crazy. “In a sea of mental health memoirs, this stands out,” reads the starred review in Publishers Weekly.

PLEASED TO MEET YOU
A few years ago I had an Aha! Moment: If someone is going to share their stories via interviews, they darn well want to know who they’ll be sitting across from, right? Last week I wrote about how my business branding evolved to include, well…me.

SENIOR STORIES
“I’ve been doing personal writing for so long that I need to remember how brave it is for someone in their 70s or 80s or 90s to take a memoir writing class.” Kate Walter on helping older writers find their voices. (If you like to discover random life writing prompts, there are a few good ones here, too!)